This IDC study provides an overview of IDC's view of key building blocks that providers of traditional outsourced-managed services (e.g., labor oriented) need to invest in as they transition to the next-generation outsourced business model referred to as cloud services. Using a combination of recent feedback from buyer studies, service provider financials including the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), and ongoing research on the topic of cloud services, this study provides a set of detailed assessments on the future end-state structure and ecosystem of a provider of outsourced-managed cloud services, the need for a shift in market penetration strategies, the breadth of risks across providers and buyers that are shaping the structure of the provider, and a financial contrast between traditional and cloud services business models. Finally, this study offers an executive summary and essential guidance on critical investments that providers need to make to ensure success, including defining the end-state structure of a "pure-play" cloud service provider and ecosystem, creating a framework to determine the pace of transition, establishing and monitoring critical business and performance metrics, defining an optimal market penetration strategy, understanding total risks and risk tolerance from service provider to buyer to government, and creating a road map of critical investments that delineate roles and responsibilities between what to own and where to partner.

"Providers of outsourced-managed services using traditional IT services approaches (e.g., labor oriented) are under increasing pressure to transition their business model to the next-generation outsourcing model involving cloud-based service delivery and consumption," says David Tapper, VP of Outsourcing, Managed, and Offshore Services at IDC. "Success for players competing in the world of traditional outsourced-managed services and needing to transition to a cloud-based outsourced-managed services business will require them to define the end-state structure of a pure-play cloud service provider and ecosystem, develop a framework to determine the pace of transition, establish and monitor critical business and performance metrics, define the optimal market penetration strategy, understand total risks and risk tolerance from service provider to buyer to government, and create a road map of critical investments that delineate roles and responsibilities between what to own and operate, and where to partner."